Readers Guide: Lawrence Block returns with ‘Hit Me’ at Library

When the announcement came in 2011 that UT women’s basketball coach Pat Summit had been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s, her millions of fans knew she would fight the disease with as much determination as she displayed during every game of her 30-plus years in the sport. She looks back at her childhood in H...

Comment

By Susie Stooksbury

Oakridger - Oak Ridge, TN

By Susie Stooksbury

Posted Mar. 17, 2013 at 3:03 PM
Updated Mar 17, 2013 at 3:07 PM

By Susie Stooksbury

Posted Mar. 17, 2013 at 3:03 PM
Updated Mar 17, 2013 at 3:07 PM

Oak Ridge, Tenn.

When the announcement came in 2011 that UT women’s basketball coach Pat Summit had been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s, her millions of fans knew she would fight the disease with as much determination as she displayed during every game of her 30-plus years in the sport. She looks back at her childhood in Henrietta, Tenn., her years in basketball — both as player and coach — and her private life, particularly her role as a mom, in “Sum it Up” (796.323).

Ward Wilson, a senior fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies of the Monterey Institute of International Studies, makes a thought-provoking case against nuclear weapons. He believes the argument that they brought a halt to the second World War is wrong — that the real reason the Japanese surrendered was the eminent threat of a Russian invasion in Manchuria. Wilson goes on to refute other assumptions that have been made to foster proliferation. Read what he has to say in “Five Myths about Nuclear Weapons” (355.021).

As the rehab business in New Orleans spirals down along with the economy, Nicholas Edwards begins to wonder how he can possibly support his family, not to mention his love of rare stamps. Relief comes with a phone call from Dot Harbison, his old scheduler from the days when he was a hit man for hire named Joseph P. Keller. Lawrence Block returns with another round of Keller’s adventures in “Hit Me” (M).

Having entertained readers with his chronicles of life as a surgeon at Boston’s Angell Animal Medical Center, Nick Trout now offers up his first novel. Veterinary pathologist Cyrus Mills is in the middle of a lawsuit to save his license when he learns his estranged father left his practice to him in his will. Hoping to sell the failing vet clinic in Eden Falls, Vt., as quickly as possible, Cyrus is not happy about returning to his hometown — even if for a brief time. Things don’t turn out quite the way he plans, though, in “The Patron Saint of Lost Dogs.”

Harlan County, Ky., has a reputation as a tough, even dangerous, place to live. From the settlers who scratched out a living to the men who worked and died in the coal mines, the people of that area are tough, determined, and fiercely proud. Alessandro Portelli, a noted oral historian, brings together 25 years of original interviews to create a unique portrait of the land and people in “They Say in Harlan County: an Oral History” (976.900).

Two brothers and their wives meet at a posh restaurant in Amsterdam. Unemployed teacher Paul Lohman and his brother Serge, a prominent politician running for Prime Minister, begin their five-course meal pleasantly catching up on their lives. By the time they reach Digestif, though, the real reason for their gathering comes out: their sons, Michel and Rick, have been videoed performing a particularly brutal act of violence. While both TV and YouTube have picked up on it, the boys have not been identified — yet. What would the discovery of their identities mean to both of the Lohman families’ lives and careers? “The Dinner” is the latest compelling novel from Herman Koch.